announcer: maureen ohlhausen -- peter: maureen ohlhausen is the acting chair of the federal trade commission, and she is our guest this week on "the communicators." what is the current status of the federal trade commission? how many people are on it? which actions can you take at this point? ms. ohlhausen: we are open for business, doing public work. very well, i think. there are two bank working members. i am the acting chairman, a republican, and my colleague carol mcsweeney, who is a democrat. we are generally bipartisan, and it -- and enforcement ornt agency. our rules allow us to have a quorum, so that is not affecting our work, but we have to reach agreement to take action. fortunately, most of the work the ftc does is very much focused on real harm to consumers, fraud. those are areas where there is a lot of agreement. -- other thing happening under my leadership, i have asked staff to take a look at the things we are doing that maybe need to be better focused, or perhaps have a more limited impact on business, had we ?efine harm sufficiently are using our resources to the best advan

. >> host: maureen ohlhausen is the acting chair of the federal trade commission, and she's our gut this week on "the communicators." chairman ohlhausen, what's the current status of the federal trade commissioning? how many people are on it, what actions can you take at this point? >> guest: well, the current status of the commission is we are open for business, we are working, we're doing the public work, work very well, i think. so there are two current members, i'm the acting chairman. i'm a republican. and i have my colleague, terrell mcsweeny, who's a democrat. but the thing to remember about the ftc is we are generally a bipartisan agency. we're an enforcement-oriented agency, so our rules allow us to have a quorum with as few as two commissioners, so that isn't affecting our work. but, of course, we have to reach agreement to take action. fortunately, most of the work that the ftc does is very much focused on real harms to consumers, fraud, we review mergers, we review antitrust issues, and those are areas where there is a lot of agreement. the other thing that's happening, you k

. >> host: maureen ohlhausen acting chair of the federal trade communication and our guest on the communicator. what is the current status of the federal trade commission? how many people are on it? what actions can you take at this point? >> the current status of the commission is we are open for business, working and doing the public work very well, i think. there are two current members. i am a republican and i have my colleague who is a democrat. the thing to remember about the fcc is we are generally a bipartisan, enforcement agency. your rules allow us to have a qualm as commissioner so that is not affecting our work. but we have reach agreement to take action. fortunately, most of the work the fcc does is very much focused on real harm to consumers, fraud, we review mergers, antitrust issues, and those are areas where there is a lot of agreement. the other thing that is happening is under my leadership as chairman i have asked staff to go back and look at the things we are doing that may be, you know, need to be better focused while perhaps have a more limited impact on business. our in

. >> host: maureen ohlhausen is the acting chair of the federal trade commission, and she's our gut this week on "the communicators." chairman ohlhausen, what's the current status of the federal trade commissioning? how many people are on it, what actions can you take at this point? >> guest: well, the current status of the commission is we

announcer: maureen ohlhausen -- peter: maureen ohlhausen is the acting chair of the federal trade commission, and she is our guest this week on "the communicators." what is the current status of the federal trade commission? how many people are on it? which actions can you take at this point? ms. ohlhausen: we are open for business, doing public work. very well, i think. there are two bank working members. i am the acting chairman, a republican, and my colleague carol mcsweeney, who is a democrat. we are generally bipartisan, and

[applause] [inaudible conversations] maureen ohlhausen. [inaudible conversations] >> booktv is on facebook. like us to get publishing news, scheduling updates, behind the scenes pictures and videos, author information and to talk directly with authors during our live programs. facebook.com/booktv. >> host: he's the holocaust studies professor emeritus at northwestern university, and he's got a new book out called "why: explaining the holocaust." professor hayes, were you able to answer your question? >> guest: that's probably not for me to judge, but with i hope so. >> host: and what was the answer? >> guest: i think to explain the holocaust, you have to explain n number of interlocking issues. there is no single explanation. there were multiple things happening that came together ina a quite special way to produce these events. so what i did, i broke down the question why into subquestions,i and i had eight of them. they were t my invention, they're questions that people have asked me repeatedly over the years, questions my studente broug